


Maybe There’s A Reason They Call Me A Demon

by Jen425



Category: Kamen Rider - All Media Types, Kamen Rider Decade, Kamen Rider Gaim, Tokusatsu
Genre: Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons, Angst, Complicated Relationships, Developing Relationships, Fallen Angels, Gen, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-04
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 06:14:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,219
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25718662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jen425/pseuds/Jen425
Summary: Gaim shouldn’t be here, Ryugen knows, and yet…
Relationships: Kazuraba Kouta/Kureshima Mitsuzane, Kumon Kaito/Takatsukasa Mai
Comments: 13
Kudos: 25





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve had this idea for a while but here it is: AU where Kouta is an Angel but [spoilers], Micchy is a Fallen Angel, Kaito is a born demon, and Mai is a human born with the power to choose the nexts ruler(s) of heaven and/or hell.
> 
> Also yes Natsumi and Takatora are Angels and Tsukasa is a born demon

“R-Ryugen?”

Ryugen turns around at the sound of his name more than the familiar voice. No one within a very large range should know him by that name, and yet…

“Gaim,” he says. It should be a growl, something torn from his throat for the way his former partner had betrayed him, but he supposes it can’t be. Not when he knows he had been responsible for… for his own Fall. It comes out choked out, hurting. The time it takes for perfect white feathers to burn away into a demon’s wings is enough to turn you bitter or broken, and he supposes he’s always been weak. “I thought you were Their little pet. You and Za…”

He cuts himself off. But no. It certainly wouldn’t be Zangetsu now. Ryugen had been the one to cut off his own brother’s wing. Gaim had simply been the one to bear witness.

(Gaim has been the one who he had stabbed straight through with a demon’s spear.)

Jealousy, a need to have them with him. Loyalty turned to obsession.

It had been Ryugen’s own fault when he hit the ground of hell and began to feel his body burn.

He certainly matches his name, now. Emerald dragon wings hidden against his back. Slit violet eyes of a reptile. He’s sure that Gaim, personally blessed by Them, would see through his shoddy human disguise.

He doesn’t know how he had come out as such a powerful demon when he had always been so weak.

“What are you doing here?” He asks, instead.

“They’re dead,” Gaim says. “Surely you know that. After all, They died with…”

“With the Snake,” Ryugen says. “I know. And?”

“There’s a human that can grant power to one,” Kouta says. “I think so, anyways. Kivala told me as much.”

_ She would have learned from Decade _ , Ryugen doesn’t say. He’s learned how to truly use and protect secrets as a means for simple survival.  _ He told me, too. _

“I know,” he says, instead. “I’m protecting her.” 

Gaim blinks.

“What?”

Ryugen rolls his eyes.

“You’re hardly the only person who wants her power,” he says. “And she’s…”

“Micchy!”

This time when Ryugen turns, it’s with a smile. A fake one, but he tries to not let her know anything close to his truth.

“Mai,” he says. “You’re back.”

Twenty year old Takatsukasa Mai is the most beautiful and kind human Ryugen has ever met. He would have become obsessed with that near-perfection in too-fragile, too-human form, had he not already learned his lesson. He had found her a mere four years ago, but he knew he could not bring her back with him to the war in hell. Nor could he relinquish her to the stark rules and empty beauty of heaven. Both would come at the cost of her life, her happiness, and her humanity.

So he shielded her from both.

Perhaps it still wasn’t the best option, but no one could still call him an Angel. 

Mai smiles, holding up a pair of cups.

“Just what you like,” she says. “Grape flavored. I don’t know why, even in  _ ice cream _ , but…”

Ryugen would almost laugh, if Gaim’s appearance hadn’t knocked him so off-kilter. He remembers the awkward way his Japanese had first come out when he arrived, even to when he found her. Old fashioned and formal, giving hint at his birth above, if anyone knew how to look. An embarrassment that he had hastily shoved off.

_ “Members of my family each have an… affinity for a specific fruit.” _

“Thank you, Mai,” he says. She’s smiling. Not exactly innocent or ignorant to human horrors, yes, but for now she is free of the war which will last till the end of time. Human food tastes like ash on a demon’s tongue sans unnatural sugars and alcohol, but it allows him to pretend, if it’s something he might have enjoyed, once.

“Of course,” Mai says. “You’re still paying, though.”

Ryugen laughs.

“Of course,” he says. He watches her gaze finally land on Gaim.

“Who’s this?” She asks. 

“An old friend,” he quickly says. “He’ll be leaving soon.”

He looks pointedly at Gaim, who blinks and, thankfully, takes the hint.

(You had always been the smart one, but you suppose Gaim had also been forced to adapt. That old twinge of guilt at what your obsession had wrought you threatens the barriers holding in your regrets once more.)

“I’ll meet you at the park across town, Ryu—Micchy,” he says. “Tomorrow afternoon?”

…But he supposes that Gaim is still Gaim. Somehow still trusts him. He’s asking for an explanation, not warning with a threat. And unlike Ryugen, he can’t lie with a smile.

“I’ll be there,” Ryugen replies.

Gaim, of course, smiles brightly.

“My name’s Kouta, by the way,” he says to Mai. “Kazuraba Kouta. I might be around more.”

Mai smiles back, of course, because she doesn’t know Gaim holds her fate in his hands.

(“And whose fault is that?” A voice whispers in his head, which Ryugen ignores.)

“I’m Mai,” she says, with a small bow. Gaim laughs.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Micchy,” he says. Ryugen takes a spoonful of his ice cream and almost breaks his spoon with his teeth before answering.

“I can’t wait.”

Things can’t possibly get much worse than this.

  
  
  


(“So this is where you’ve been, Ryugen,” says yet another familiar voice, just an hour later, and Ryugen wonders if They or the Snake have personally cursed him from past their final Ends.

He turns, glaring, transformed to full power in an instant.

“Baron,” he growls. “What business does hell’s  _ interim  _ ruler have here on Earth.”

“The same as hell’s missing too-powerful coward, it seems,” Baron replies. “So you’ve met him too”

Ryugen blinks. 

“Him?”

“Their Chosen,” Baron says. “Kazuraba Kouta.”

…there is no way this is a coincidence.

Fuck.)


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ryugen has to think fast and maybe takes advantage of a certain ally needing him

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It’s official this thing is a Decade crossover

Ryugen doesn’t trust easily. Of course he doesn’t, no one trusting survives hell intact. He’s exceptionally cautious, however. It makes his alliances few, even fewer lasting.

(Decade is a unique case, him and his… lackeys, for lack of a better word, hate hell as much as Ryugen himself does.)

He’d been except unlucky, he knows, picked off from the field of writhing Fallen Angels and humans with enough power and cruelty in their hearts to be reborn as Demons. He doesn’t remember when, but he knows his scaled wings had already begun to form.

He tries not to think of those first few centuries under  _ her _ thumb, but it had been some horrible form of useful to be the pet of one of hell’s most skilled manipulators.

That all said, Ryugen is also an excellent liar. He had spent four years close to Mai and the most she’s figured out is he’s probably seen bad shit, which is, well, very true, but he’s officially a foreigner, not a Fallen Angel of a Demon who had cut off his own brother’s wing and tried to murder his partner.

Sometimes the best lies are steeped in truth.

“Of course I know Kazuraba Kouta,” he says. True, because Kouta is Gaim. And he knows Gaim very well. “I won’t let you near him, though.”

True.

Surely he owes Gaim this much.

Baron hmms.

“Is that almost some kind of strength out of you?”

Ryugen’s eyes flash violet with his power. He hates using it. It burns his skin, this power.

But he’d wanted it, once.

Regardless, he’d never really been the type meant for power. Someone should strap a warning to him. “Warning: ticking time bomb”.

It takes a lot to kill a demon, usually.

“Perhaps,” Ryugen says. “You have who I was before I Fell perfectly pegged, you know.”

True.

“I will have the strength I seek,” Baron says. 

“And I will protect Kouta,” Ryugen says. This time, he has to.

  
  
  


Ryugen pulls approximately 200 strings to make Decade join him at the meeting the next day. Mostly it’s out of spite, but he’s allowed to be petty when his situation is now five times more complicated.

“You’re manipulative,” Decade says.

“You have a leak,” Ryugen replies, simply. “Baron found out about Mai, but he thinks it’s…”

“Oh, the Angel that got reborn as a human?”

…Of course Decade knows about that.

“Someone in heaven could get your lover in a lot of trouble,” Ryugen says.

“Maybe if someone realizes she isn’t trying to kill me,” Decade says. “Terrifying Angel that she is.”

…since Ryugen doesn’t actually want to touch much more on the affair between his ally and his ex-partner’s sister, he doesn’t give any other reply.

  
  
  


Gaim’s explanation is a mess of words that more or less lines up with Ryugen’s theory. He’d been with Them during the fight and ended up so close that he’d died in the explosion upon the fight’s end, reborn as a human, Kouta Kazuraba. He’d only regained his memories a few months ago, when he’d caught sight of Kivala by chance.

…The explanation is probably helped by Kivala’s additions, admittedly.

She’s wary of him, Ryugen notes, but he had never expected otherwise. He had injured her brother and her fellow Angel, and anger is not inherently taboo. He meets her gaze without flinching.

He asks no forgiveness, takes care to create no pity. He’s sick of pity.

“That makes sense, right?” Gaim asks.

“I’d say he gets the gist of it,” Decade says.

Ryugen nods.

“So what we have is an even bigger mess than you told me,” he tells Decade. “And you still want my help.”

“I’m sorry, you’d prefer one of the  _ other _ demons vying for hell?” Kivala asks. Ryugen looks at her, takes Gaim’s hand, and drags the Angel turned human away.

  
  
  


(“He’s actually more trustworthy than you think,” Decade says. Kivala stares.

“He stabbed Gaim through with a demon’s blade  _ before _ he Fell.”

“You know as well as I do that Falling affects mental states.”

“That… DiEnd was different. He was framed.”

Decade hmms. Kivala sighs.

“…You really trust him?”)

  
  
  


Ryugen has, in his time on Earth, gotten used to necessary touch from others. It’s not something as common between angels, who would often exchange affection through telepathy. And unless Ryugen needed them, it was not something he allowed another demon to do, either. Not after…

Well. It is what it is.

(It’s still less than his crimes deserve, when he can remember the way Kouta’s and his brother’s perfect lightblood had looked across the clear glass floor that day. The realization that he could never go back, that he hadn’t been protecting them, just jealous. Frozen on the floor next to the two people he cared for most until he was dragged before Them and cast down where he belongs.)

He doesn’t realize he’s still holding Ga—Kouta’s hand until they stop outside the base.

“Ryugen,” Kouta says. “Where are you taking me?”

Ryugen freezes.

“I…” he offers. “We need a cover for you. Or at least for me on Team Gaim, with Baron on our tail. Do you still dance?”

They’d sometimes joined the more aiding-the-good-dead-souls type Angels, once, as entertainers.

“Y-yeah,” Kouta says. “Why… Wait Team  _ Gaim???? Baron _ is after me????? Ryu—”

“Great,” Ryugen interrupts. “Time to introduce you to the team.”

  
  
  


“Micchy! You’re here!”

“Mai said you weren’t coming today.”

“Who’d you bring with you?”

Ryugen will admit his smile is real when he sees the team. He’d joined for Mai, the convenient shared interest an eccelent foot in the door for being able to keep watch of her, but every human in the team matters to him, now.

“This is Kouta,” he explains. “He’s an old friend who just moved to town. I was hoping he could join us, just for today?”

Kouta’s smile, when Ryugen turns, is just as legitimate. He’s still so happy and trusting after everything and the voice inside of Ryugen that had stabbed Kouta with a demon’s spear before he even Fell still growls in envy.

“Micchy and I used to dance together when we were… younger,” he says. He hesitates on every other word, but he always hated lying. Even if it’s sometimes necessary when on Earth.

“I don’t see why not,” says the team’s leader, Yuuya. 

  
  
  


“Your friend is a good dancer,” Mai says, afterwards. “I can tell you’ve danced with him before, he was syncing off of you.”

Ryugen blinks, watching Kouta chat with the rest of the team.

“He does?”

Mai sighs.

“Yeah,” she says. “Hey, Micchy, you said you were emancipated, right?”

“Yeah,” he replies.

“Why did you leave home, though?” She asks. Across the room, Kouta laughs. “I mean, obviously you had people you cared about.”

Ryugen sighs, ets his emotions show to Mai for a rare moment.

“Kouta is incredibly forgiving,” he says. “I’m not.”

“Oh,” Mai says. “I’m sorry if I brought up something you didn’t—”

“It’s okay, Mai,” Ryugen interrupts, plastering a smile back on his face. “I’m fine.”

“O-okay, Micchy,” she says, unconvinced.

From across the room, he hears someone say Kouta should join the team.

Well, at least his plan worked.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like I should mention that I have no plan for any of this so it’ll pretty much always be marked as complete unless the cliff hanger is too huge


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mai may not know what’s going on, but the plot sure does still involve her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before anyone asks, yes, Ryugen cursed Rat. Obviously, it was reversible. Ryugen is simultaneously mid-canon AND post-canon Micchy. Also I’ve decided this fic will be Kouta/Micchy and Kaito/Mai.

“A new team?” Micchy asks, the surprise obvious in his voice. Mai nods.

“I saw them when Yuuya sent me to sign us up for the competition,” she says.

“We’ve seen new teams before,” he points out. “It’s probably nothing, especially if they’re a new team.”

Mai shakes her head.

“No, I know there’s something strange about them,” she says. “Yuuya doesn’t think it’s a big deal, either, but this Team Baron…”

Micchy’s phone clatters to the table.

“Baron,” he says. Mai nods. “You know something?”

Micchy shakes his head.

“It’s probably just a coincidence,” he says. “Still, it might be interesting for a whole new team to join the competition this year. Gaim made our start in the Beat Riders competition, right?”

Mai hmms. She supposes Micchy has a point.

Still, she has a strange feeling about the man she’d met at signups…

  
  
  


_ One two three four five six seven eight, one two three four five six seven eight, one two three four… _

Mai runs through the count in her head as she goes through the motions. It’s fun to practice with her team, important, even, but sometimes doing it outside, alone, reminds of where it started. She’d never thought of it as a career until it became one, not that she much minds, but…

“You’re on team Gaim,” a voice says behind her, breaking her rhythm. She turns.

“You’re from the new team,” she replies. “Baron, was it?”

“I lead it,” the man says. His red and black jacket sparkles in the sunlight. “Tell me, is your team strong?”

“What do you mean?” Mai asks. The man hmms.

“Your team’s name means armored warrior,” he says. “I was curious if your team lived up to your title.”

“We’re good dancers, if that’s what you mean,” Mai says, a little annoyed now that his purpose has shown. Her team has worked hard to get where it is! “And what about you, Baron?”

“My strength will be proven soon,” the man replies. “I’ll see you at auditions, Gaim.”

“My name is Mai,” Mai replies. “Takatsukasa Mai… and yes, we’ll see you then.”

The man hmms in acknowledgement, but does not reply with his own name.

Just then, Mai hears her phone ring.

“Yeah?” She asks, answering.

“Mai, Rat just collapsed,” says Chucky’s worries voice. “We don’t know why.”

“What?” Mai asks. “Is he okay?”

“He isn’t responding,” Chucky replies. “I really hope he’s okay. Rica’s already called the ambulances.”

“Are the others with you?” Mai asks. “Where are you?”

“It’s just us, but we’re at the base,” Chucky replies. “Practice isn’t for another half hour, and I want to go with him. I’m so worried, Mai…”

Mai quickly does the math.

“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” she says. Call me if the ambulance gets there first.”

  
  
  


The good news is, Rat is fine. He comes to right as Mai gets there. Micchy arrives a few moments later.

“I saw the ambulance,” he says. “Is everything okay?”

“Rat collapsed,” Rica explains. “Seems he’s fine now.” She turns to the aforementioned dancer. “But I’m still making you go to the hospital after.”

Rat raises his hands.

“I will,” he says. “Seriously, though. I feel fine.”

Micchy smiles, but Mai notes that it looks slightly strained.

“I’m sure it really is a false alarm,” he says. “Besides, the competition is in two weeks, and it seems we might have… new competition.”

It sounds wrong the way he says those last words, but Mai can’t place it, so she shrugs it off. Micchy’s always been a bit mysterious, but he’s always there. She has a feeling something bad had happened in his past, but she supposes that’s none of his business.

It’s probably nothing.

  
  
  


She’s the one who runs into the new team’s leader, the next time. Two significantly nicer seeming men in matching uniforms drag him into Bandou’s. She can’t help but look up from where she’d been trying to learn more about her new teammate, and Kouta follows her gaze to the three members of Baron.

(He feels off to her, but less so than Kaito. And either way, it feels different. Kaito more makes her think of Micchy when they’d first met, before she knew her friend.)

“You’re our leader, so you’ve got to spend some time with us eventually,” one says. He seems… oddly familiar.

“I’m here, aren’t I?” He responds.

“You never seem to enjoy it, though,” says the other, as the first turns around.

Oh!

“Zack!” Mai calls. He turns to her.

“Mai!” He greets, leading the other two over. “How are you?”

“Great,” she responds. “You joined Baron?”

Zack rubs his neck.

“Technically, Kaito joined us,” he says. “You know how I’ve been wanting to join the larger competitions this past year? Well, about two months ago, Kaito came to help us out.”

“That’s great,” Mai replies. Zack nods, smiling, before looks over at Kouta.

“You got someone new?”

“Kazuraba Kouta,” Kouta introduces himself. “It’s… nice to meet you.”

Mai looks back at the other two. Zack blinks.

“Oh right,” he says. “These are Kaito and Peco.”

“It’s nice to meet you properly,” Mai says to them. Kaito hmms, but they end up sitting together.

  
  
  


She still doesn’t know much about Kaito, she keeps thinking, and she wonders why it bothers her so much. He’s one of three people that just feel  _ different  _ to her, maybe. Like Micchy, or like Kouta, but that’s not all it is.

It’s his words, his actions, a question she can’t shake of  _ where did he come from? _

It starts coming to a head after they tie in the auditions.

He comes up to her after, with a calculating look in his eyes.

“You dance differently than the others,” he says. “You use all your strength, but it isn’t in competition.”

Mai can only shrug.

“I joined Gaim when we were a street dance team,” she says. “We still are, most of the time. Our only competitions are Beat Riders and Golden Fruit National. We get exposure and money from these, but that’s never why I dance.”

Kaito hmms.

“I will keep my eye on you, Takatsukasa Mai,” he says. Mai just smiles.

“And you, Kaito,” she says. “We’ll see how this goes.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on Tumblr @flaim-ita or @dancingqueen-mai for just Toku


End file.
